A man lies on a piano bench. Across from him, another man sits reading Variety. behind them both, a third man is in the process of buiding a model airplane, as he has been since the beginning of the concert. Over the PA, a sampled voice repeats ‘Isn’t this annoying’. The audience laughed about two minutes ago, but is now just sitting uncomfortably, wondering what will happen next, if anything. Suddenly, and audience member takes matters into his own hands. “Hey! Do you know where the bathroom is?” It is the same man from whom the Variety issue was taken when the vocal was first sampled. He walks up to the first row and attempts to pick up the fattest man in attendance. He fails, picks up a slice of pizza that has fallen on the floor from earlier in the performance, and eats it. The band had not planned this, the atmosphere caused it. The band does nothing but follow the flow that has now been established.

Circa 1993, a young Joe Mapplebeck began disovering a passion for the unpredictable. This love manifested itself in the form of a guitar, a four-track recorder and a whole lot of effects units. Under the tutelage of nothing more than an adventurous spirit, large scale electronic compositions found life in the privacy of his basement apartment. It was not until the entrance of Barry Seroff into his life that these works matured and set out for the public. While Joe was creating electronic masterpieces in his basement, Barry Seroff was creating similarly spirited compositions within a stricter environment; the Aaron Copland School of Music. The presence of the unpredictable in the music of John Cage, Frank Zappa and the Art Ensemble of Chicago, as well as the philosophic influence of Zen, had already guided his compositional style. However, these concepts could not reach fruition until Joe Mapplebeck had made his mark. The duo played its first composition at Roulette on November 5th, 2000 to a stunned and thoroughly impressed audience. However, schedules conflicted and they were forced to limit their performances to late night jam sessions. It wasn’t until a year and a half later when the skies opened up and the band (made up of Joe, Barry and a few performers) played again, this time at the Knitting Factory. Although the music grew more focused and performances more intricate, there remained a missing element. At a performance in late 2002 in the audience sat a man named Gerry Tuohy. A brilliant percussionist, Gerry had been playing since the mid-80’s. There were no musical borders for him, he had played everything from folk rock to classical to the most extreme death metal. But he had never heard anything like this. As the show progressed, a universe unfolded. He was hooked. It was at this point forward that the duo was a trio and finally Little Ricky had what it lacked; a groove.

Conceptually, the group is rooted in creating an atmosphere in which anything can happen. To create this environment, they take influence from Zen teachings as much as from Western influences. The idea is that of a Zen koan; to create a situation in which the mind, trying to relate the most unrelated ideas, is shocked into a state of enlightenment. While this is all well and good, the idea of enlightenment may be a little out of their league, so they settle for comedy. The resulting comedy, however, is unlike anything seen before. These ideas are also pervasive through the music. Since the observer cannot be prepared for the performance, each performance is an original composition. Further, these compositions are improvisatory, leading to open-ended pieces often directed by the reaction from the audience. The instrumentation also reflects this; they often focus on ethnic instruments as well as found objects (often donated or annexed from audience members), leading to surprisingly original tone colors and melodic concepts. The envelope is being pushed, the boundaries are endless, transparent. When Art breaks from its creator, it becomes its own entity, guides itself with its own independent rules. This is success. when this success is not only dense with purpose (only found in purposelessness) but also damned funny, you are shoe shopping at Little Ricky’s House of Chanklettas.